EKOOR, a Green Energy Promoter in IoT, has launched a series of Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons that are aimed towards many applications including smart home automation. The Beacons are primarily powered by ambient light and need no battery swap for many years. EKOOR is currently running a Kickstarter campaign to support the production of these beacons in what would be an effort to keep the unit’s market price as low as possible.

What are Proximity Beacons?
They are small Bluetooth low energy devices that broadcast small radio signals known as iBeacon or eddystone which many smart phones can pickup and interpret information, such as the approximate distance to the Beacon. Knowing such proximity information opens up possibilities to a whole new set of applications including smart home automation and proximity advertising to name a few.

Proximity Intelligence to Smart Homes?
Beacons can provide an additional proximity intelligence layer to smart homes to activate/deactivate devices depending on someone's presence with their smart phone in different regions in a home. Such automation could also save energy costs by activating smart devices when the occupants really need them.

EKOOR Beacons can now be combined with the Beecon IOS App from Beaconsandwich or BeaconThigs App from Samsung Smartthings, to control literally any smart home device automatically depending on someone's presence in different regions in a home.

Eco-Friendly Beacons:
The Beacons themselves are Eco-friendly as they harness indoor light through a highly efficient photovoltaic cell to power the Beacon. An additional backup battery is in place when sufficient lighting conditions are not available for a long time.

With EKOOR proximity beacons relying on ambient light, they go around the complexity of having to change batteries every one or two years. While such a battery change might be trivial to a home owner in a home automation product, EKOOR believes its innovation will make life simpler to many IoT verticals that can have a large network of such devices. The cost savings of such large deployments will be significant. On another angle why not green energy, when it is possible with today’s technology.

Longest Lifespan in the Industry:
According to Gayan Gamage, EKOOR’s CEO and founder, the proximity beacon’s ability to transmit multiple protocols such as iBeacons and eddystone together under ambient light conditions makes EKOOR Beacons superior than any other Beacons in the market in addition to having many years of lifetime.

Multiple Beacon Types:
EKOOR beacons come in two varieties. EKOOR-B beacons suitable for short ranges (up to 50m) and EKOOR-LR that are suitable for long range deployments. By combining these powerful beacons with an equally smart and adaptable management and developer platform, EKOOR has managed to come up with a system that will not only allow lights in living rooms to activate when occupants arrive, but also power strategic advertisement and collect vital business intelligence in large indoors like shopping malls and retailers etc.

Order a pack of Eco-friendly Beacons today and see what proximity intelligence can do to smart homes by visiting the campaign and selecting a pledge. The Beacons are scheduled to ship by end of April 2016.